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You Will Love This!

I hope everyone had a wonderful July 4th! We actually have hope for our country for the first time in many, many years. Did you catch President Trump's address at the Kennedy Center last night??? It was jump to you feet and shout hallelujah time! They are offering free dvd's of it at ptv.org or 866-327-0033. May God grant his requests for America!!!

We were blessed to share the holiday with my daughter and her boyfriend, who brought us treasures of fresh veggies from their gardens, and deer hamburgers. That was a first for us, but he mixed it with hamburger and we really couldn't taste it.

I do so love to make pretty tablescapes to make things festive and bless people! Such fun! I had no idea I had red, white and blue things, but I shopped my house and here's what I came up with.

The crab cupcakes in sand were the stars. So adorable! They are atop Key Lime Cupcakes (by request), which are so delicious! Get it? Key Lime...Florida Keys...and crabs? :) The recipe is here.

I was able to find craft paper looking liners from Wilton which would have been perfect sand color with spice cupcakes, but the Key Lime showed through a little making them look not so sand colored. I sprinkled extra "sand" around to make it prettier. They were a big hit. I have directions at the bottom if you'd like to make them too.

We named them all Sebastian for the Little Mermaid and could almost hear him saying, "Thank you. Thank you!" Don't you just love his voice? There is a character on Death In Paradise that sounds just like him. :)

Remember my two scrap made pedestals? I do so love them and they're so perfect here. I had bought two random cloches on clearance long ago, so I had a taller one on hand when the crab was too tall for the regular cloche that I keep on the tower of pedestals. Perfect!

The firecracker cupcakes were fun too. They were chocolate cupcakes in blue liners with red, white and blue sprinkles around the edges. The "firecrackers" were marshmallows dipped in red chocolate melts. I was unable to find licorice whips for the fuses, so I had to use twine. Looked fine and no one ate the fuses!

The diamonds on the table were to be stars. They were table confetti from Hobby Lobby. On the right is a bowl of blueberries topped with watermelon stars. I used the middle star from the set of three fondant star cutters from Hobby Lobby. Gotta love their always 40% off coupons! And their politics! God bless them! The other bowl keeps the red and white theme with garden fresh cucumbers and tomatoes! Nothing like fresh from the garden!

Frosty lemonade in tall Ball jars had skewers of blueberries and watermelon stars.

Red, white and blue parfaits in half pint Ball jars. They were cherry red stripes, white chocolate pudding white stripes, blue jello stripes topped with blueberries. So convenient to make ahead as each was a serving and had it's own top to keep them fresh! Also handy to send home with people.

Ahh, now for the adorable crabs!

No, I did not create these precious guys, or the firecracker design. I saw pictures on line and figured them out. THANK YOU to whoever was so clever to make the first ones and share the pictures on line!

I got the Haribo peaches and Great Value orange slices at Walmart. The Wilton googly eyes are available at craft stores and Walmart. These candies are the stickiest substances I have ever encountered! I was actually concerned that I'd never be able to use my scissors, knife and plate again, but was delighted that hot water took care of it.

I actually cut the hard outer edges off pieces left over from cutting claws and eyes out of the peach candies and used the sticky inside to cement the googly eyes to the peach eyeballs I'd cut out with a frosting tip.

I used a #12 round tip to cut eyeballs from the peach candies. I was able to stick my rose nail in the end of the frosting tip to remove the new eyeball.

Tada! Isn't he adorable?

I tinted my frosting beige so shocking white didn't show through the "sand".

The sand is:

1 cup of graham cracker crumbs

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup butter

I sprinkled the sand on freshly frosted cupcakes and had some left for staging the tablescape. It looks so real and smells wonderful!

I added two more toothpicks under each crab's body to anchor them in the cupcakes. It worked wonderfully and not one stayed in the cake. As the candies dry, they really cement the toothpicks to themselves.

The gorgeous red pedestal bowl, napkins, place mats, chargers, all serving bowls and flatware were all from my darling Home Goods!